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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27782941">I Found a Home (in Your Eyes)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/plutosrobin/pseuds/plutosrobin'>plutosrobin</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Criminal Minds (US TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>5+1 Things, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Study, Emily Central, F/F, JJ is oblivious, Jemily - Freeform, Lesbian Emily Prentiss, One Shot, POV Emily Prentiss, but i get rid of him pretty quickly, emily is gay and yearning, emily just wants to feel at home, god i love these dorks, includes mentions of Will, sort of an exploration of her journey</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 08:08:22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,630</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27782941</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/plutosrobin/pseuds/plutosrobin</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Emily Prentiss has spent her life pretending. She manages well enough until joining the BAU, when a certain Jennifer Jareau destroys all her hard work with a single stroke.</p><p>OR</p><p>5 times Emily Prentiss built up her walls and the 1 time she let them come crumbling down.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jennifer "JJ" Jareau/Emily Prentiss</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>147</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>I Found a Home (in Your Eyes)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>i had this idea of emily's development and her coming to terms with her feelings, plus i was stuck in my jemily feels, and this was the result. a little more angsty than i originally intended (self-projection who? idk her) but hopefully you enjoy &lt;3</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>One:</strong>
</p><p>Being on the move as a child sounded a lot more fun than it actually was.</p><p>Emily Prentiss was lucky, she knew. Never struggling for money, she and her mother spent their time travelling the world for ambassador duties that young Emily didn’t have the comprehension or interest to bother understanding. All she knew was that she was constantly visiting new places, trying new cuisines, learning new languages, meeting new people. She was lucky.</p><p>But with that transience came a bone deep loneliness, never staying in one place long enough to find her tribe. It was the friends she left behind in France (or Spain, or Belgium, or Germany) that promised to stay in touch, but let communication fizzle out after a few short weeks. It was the way she learnt to never get too close to anyone because it would just make the goodbyes that much harder. It was the way the only constants in her life were her mother (more focused on her work than her daughter) and the battered old suitcases that she barely got the chance to unpack before they were on the move again. It was lonely.</p><p>At 15, Emily and her mother settled for a while in Rome, longer than they usually would, and the young girl allowed herself to briefly think of the place as home. She met Matthew Benton, one of the greatest friends she had made in her travels, and formed a circle of people that may not have been the best influences, but they liked her. They really liked her. And that was all she could ask for.</p><p>Fifteen years of solitude really took all the reservations out of a girl, so she did practically anything she could to fit in with this new group. When they all started drinking, she took her first shot. When they all started smoking, she bought her first cigarette pack. When they all started dating, she ignored the fact that all the girls seemed to be prettier than all the boys, and found her first boyfriend. </p><p>But none of them got pregnant. None of them faced a crisis of religion and an impossible decision before they even finished 9th grade. </p><p>Matt stood by her side of course, fiercely loyal from the moment she found out to the moment it was all over. He held Emily’s hand on one of the hardest days of her life, when she chose to terminate the pregnancy. He stuck by her side while she fell apart.</p><p>When it was time to leave Rome, it didn’t feel like home anymore. Emily knew she wouldn’t miss the group of people that she had called friends. She wouldn’t miss the city or the painful memories it held. She wouldn’t miss her ‘boyfriend’, lanky and awkward always managing to say the wrong thing. She’d miss Matt, though. She’d miss his unwavering support, his smile that stretched out like a safety net.</p><p>So, from that moment on, Emily had to become her own safety net.</p><p>---</p><p>
  <strong>Two:</strong>
</p><p>Being at the FBI academy was hard, and not just for all the obvious reasons.</p><p>Endless hours of training and studying, physical exams and intellectual exams, firearms training and everything else you could possibly think of – they were difficult. But they were also expected. What Emily didn’t expect was how much harder it would be to try and hide her feelings. </p><p>Though moving so much when she was young had been tough, it made it easier to avoid attachment to anyone, including any possible fleeting crushes she may have had. Now, being in one place for so long, making friends (and being constantly surrounded with badass FBI women) – well, it was obviously more of a struggle.</p><p>As usual, Emily imposed a strict control over herself, never letting flirty banter with her female friends cross over the line into actual flirting (no matter how much she wanted it to). The Prentiss’ were perfect, she told herself. Upstanding role-models with no room for anything remotely out of the ordinary.</p><p>One evening, though, while out with some of her fellow trainees, Emily felt that mask beginning to slip a bit. She had been at the academy long enough now that it was starting to feel like home, and she had even let herself get the slightest bit attached to the friends she made there. They all decided to spend their Friday night at the local bar, dancing and drinking and forgetting their responsibilities for just a while.</p><p>It was on this evening that Emily pulled up in the parking lot of the bar, seeing her group huddled around the door, laughing together, carefree. She saw the relaxed set of their shoulders, saw the way they clung to their dates’ hands without a care in the world of receiving a second look. And she just couldn’t pretend that night.</p><p>Emily dropped one of the girls a text to say that she was coming down with something and wouldn’t be able to make it, watching through her dirty windshield as the girl looked down at her phone, then presumably told the others so they all followed her into the bar.</p><p>And Emily drove off alone.</p><p>She wasn’t entirely sure where she was going, but as long as it was away from that place, she didn’t care. Away from all those people who wore their hearts on their sleeves and didn’t stop to thank their lucky stars that it was an option for them. That being happy was an option for them.</p><p>After around half an hour of aimless driving, Emily found herself at yet another bar, this one far enough away from the academy that she was sure she wouldn’t see anyone she knew here. She slipped through the door to find it entirely packed full of everyone from elderly business men to college students, all strangers, all of whom didn’t afford her a second glance. </p><p>Emily slid onto a free stool at the bar, looking up to place her order and meeting the eyes of the undeniably stunning barmaid.</p><p>“What can I getcha, sweetness?”</p><p>She ordered a whiskey quickly, trying to keep the nervous stammer out of her voice as she glanced down at the woman’s nametag – Nadia.</p><p>“Coming right up,” Nadia said with a smile. And as she slinked off to the other side of the bar, Emily could’ve sworn she saw the other woman wink at her. But no. It must have been a trick of the light.</p><p>It was only when Emily was in Nadia’s room above the bar a few hours later, lips swollen and hands wandering over unexplored territory, that she considered that the wink may not have been a trick of the light. Still, Emily told herself, this was just the whiskey in her. This was just her being young and experimental. This was nothing and it would lead nowhere, and she definitely wasn’t having more fun than she’d had since she joined the academy.</p><p>Driving back to the academy that night, head still fuzzy with the crackling electricity of stolen kisses and sweet whispered nothings, she told herself that it wouldn’t happen again. This was one slip up, one mistake that she wouldn’t repeat. </p><p>A mistake that she could not stop smiling about.</p><p>Ignoring this, she pulled up to the academy and couldn’t help but think that it didn’t feel like home now. Just like Rome, some switch had flicked inside her. She wasn’t home anymore.</p><p>---</p><p>
  <strong>Three:</strong>
</p><p>By the time Emily Prentiss had joined the BAU, she had kept her promise to herself. No more slip-ups since that one in the bar. She stepped into SSA Aaron Hotchner’s office that fateful morning with confidence that this chapter of her life would finally be the one to make her mother proud.</p><p>That started going downhill almost immediately, when she was told that there must have been some sort of mistake, that she wasn’t supposed to be here. And it got even worse when a certain blonde media liaison tapped on the door and popped her head in to tell the man that their team was gathering. She smiled at Emily, quickly, in passing, and the dark-haired agent knew this was going to be a lot harder than she’d originally thought.</p><p>Getting to know the BAU didn’t make it any easier. If only the media liaison (or JJ, as Emily came to know her) had been a horrible person, it would’ve made her much easier to avoid. As it was, JJ was kind and funny and <em>goddamn beautiful</em> and Emily found it harder and harder every day to force the mask onto her face.</p><p>Long cases turned into long nights in shared hotel rooms (when there wasn’t enough left for the whole team to have one each), when Emily lay awake all night and listened to steady breathing from the other side of the room, wondering how the hell she got herself into this mess. Long flights on the team’s jet became torturous as Emily’s shoulder was offered as a cushion for JJ’s tired head. </p><p>And yet Emily knew she wouldn’t have it any other way.</p><p>As much as it hurt to spend every day pining like some sort of sad puppy, it was the price she had to pay for the blonde’s friendship, and in comparison, it was a bargain. So, she smiled and laughed and did all the things friends were supposed to do. She busied herself with work and the occasional one-night stand – always with men with heavy hands and too much stubble and not enough patience. She did everything to please others and nothing for herself, and she slipped seamlessly into the team as though she’d always been there. </p><p>Going from the bureau to her apartment still didn’t feel like going home. Sure, her clothes were there, her food and her beloved cat and her furniture. But it wasn’t home.</p><p>In fact, Emily wasn’t sure anything had felt like home in a long time.</p><p>---</p><p>
  <strong>Four:</strong>
</p><p>William LaMontagne Jr. A southern detective with an easy smile and a charming disposition and everything any cheesy hallmark movie could possibly want.</p><p>Emily hated him.</p><p>It wasn’t that he was a bad man, not at all. He was smart enough and good looking enough and kind enough – sure. But he just wasn’t good enough for JJ. Emily wasn’t sure anyone was good enough for JJ, but that was beside the point.</p><p>She wasn’t entirely sure why she encouraged the blonde to go after Will. Maybe in some twisted way she thought it’d be easier to know she could never be with JJ like that if somebody else had already filled the position.</p><p>She couldn’t have been more wrong.</p><p>Watching the two of them in that police station, after she had given JJ the shove she needed to fall into his arms – it ripped her heart out. Any lingering hope she’d been unaware of disappeared immediately at the sight. She turned to leave the station, which to anyone else may have seemed like a respectful way of giving the two some privacy, but really, she just needed to get out. She needed to be somewhere else, anywhere else, somewhere full of air because that room had definitely been emptied of all its oxygen.</p><p>Emily stumbled into the bathroom and found it mercifully empty. She braced her hand on the edge of a sink and gripped the porcelain with white knuckles, trying to ignore the constantly replaying image of Will and JJ and instead putting all of her focus into gulping down as much air as she could manage. Just as she was starting to remember how to breathe like a normal person, the door of the bathroom swung open to reveal a smiling and tousled Agent Jennifer Jareau.</p><p>“Em, you won’t believe what just happened!”</p><p>As JJ launched into the story of her and Will’s oh-so-romantic encounter, Emily put all of her concentration into maintaining a friendly smile and nodding at all of the right places.</p><p>In, out, “That’s amazing.”<br/>
In, out, “He seems like a catch.”<br/>
In, out, “I’m glad you’re happy, Jennifer.”</p><p>JJ looked a little confused at the use of her full name but didn’t press it, too busy being wrapped up in her own little butterfly filled bubble to notice they way that Emily’s breathing was still a little ragged and her eyes were still a little watery.</p><p>On the plane home, Emily took up her usual post as JJ’s cushion and tried to ignore the way her shoulder burned with the contact. Instead she stared out of the window of the jet at the city lights all blurring together underneath her, and wondered if anywhere would ever feel like home again.</p><p>---</p><p>
  <strong>Five:</strong>
</p><p>Naturally, when Will broke JJ’s heart, she turned to Emily for support.</p><p>And of course, though her stomach was swirling with an indescribable rage at the detective who had hurt her girl, though her heart ached in sympathy (for both JJ and herself), she was there. She was there with warm smiles and hands to hold and comforting words that were a little too loving and a little too true.</p><p>Will, as it turns out, flirted with a lot of people who visited his little police station. All at the same time. After a few months, JJ discovered she wasn’t the only “honey” he was showering with flowers and compliments. He had a whole goddamn jar of honey. </p><p>So, when JJ went to the bar with the team and found Will, her Will, dancing dangerously close to a leggy woman in a red dress, she was understandably upset. Derek offered to beat the guy into a pulp, Garcia said she’d hack and drain his bank accounts, Rossi recommended some sort of dramatic revenge plot, Reid suggested someone should ‘accidentally’ spill a drink on him, and even Hotch laid a comforting hand on the blonde’s shoulder, positioning himself between her and the southern detective. Emily, for her part, wrapped the other woman in her arms, overcome with a fierce protectiveness, and lead her out of the bar with their little BAU family on her heels.</p><p>JJ bounced back of course, being as strong as she was, but it wasn’t without help. Penelope and Emily mostly got her through it, unwavering pillars of support on her down days, and her up days, and every day in-between. JJ even dramatically declared once that she was done with men, and Emily tried extremely hard not to notice how her heart jumped at the statement.</p><p>Of course, the comment was in passing, and JJ went back to dating eventually. It wasn’t as bad when Emily didn’t know about it, but one day the blonde came sauntering into the office and dropped herself onto the corner of Derek’s desk, and the darker-haired woman watched as they engaged in an animated conversation about the blind date he was setting JJ up on. </p><p>“Prentiss,” Morgan called, holding up his phone to show a picture of a handsome guy on the beach. “What do you think? JJ’s not sure.”</p><p>Clear blue eyes focused intently on Emily as she stammered for an answer. “He’s- uhh… If JJ wants to go, then she should.”</p><p>Morgan scoffed, “you’re no fun Prentiss,” then returned to chatting with JJ.</p><p>Emily was too focused on staring at the wood of her desk to notice the way the blonde’s eyes lingered on her, a little confused, a little hopeful.</p><p>The profiler instead wondered when she’d stop lying. She wondered if she’d ever have the courage to own up to her own feelings.</p><p>That night sat in her apartment, thinking of JJ out on the date with the handsome man at the very same moment, Emily had never felt less at home.</p><p>---</p><p>
  <strong>Six:</strong>
</p><p>The day Garcia was shot was hard on all of the team. Sitting in that hospital waiting room, waiting for news, Emily was reminded of a certain day back in a certain police station that had felt empty of air. She maintained her cool, though, knowing her team needed a little stability at that moment. She let her hand drift out to hold on to JJ’s and for once she wasn’t focused on the nerves that came from contact with the blonde, too wrapped up instead in her fear for her fallen friend.</p><p>They stayed like that for at least an hour, until the doctor entered the room to announce that Penelope was going to be ok. There was a widespread sigh of relief in the room, Hotch clapping Derek on the shoulder as he covered his eyes for a second. JJ looped her arms around Emily’s neck and Rossi was pulling Reid into a hug. And just for a moment, it was all ok.</p><p>Later that night, when the shooter had been caught and the case was closed, the BAU team unanimously decided to camp out in Garcia’s living room, unwilling to leave the woman alone and unprotected after the terrifying day they’d had.</p><p>Not only was it unusual for the whole team to gather at one members house, but having Aaron Hotchner (grumpiest man alive) attend what was essentially a sleepover was quite possibly one of the strangest things they’d ever experienced. The BAU spent their time watching movies and joking about how they’d get to see Hotch’s jammies, gorging themselves on pizza and doing everything they could to lift Garcia’s spirits. </p><p>They had all finally dropped off at an ungodly hour of the morning, but Emily was still propped up on the floor with her back against the sofa. She’d never admit it, but she was a little scared to fall asleep. She didn’t want to leave her team vulnerable again. Her back was starting to ache, though, so she jumped up from the floor and slipped out of the window onto Garcia’s fire escape, drinking in the chilly air.</p><p>From her back pocket, Emily pulled out a pack of cigarettes, lighting one up and balancing it between her lips. She could almost hear her mother yelling at her, but ignored the sound in favour of listening to the city rush by underneath her.</p><p>She wasn’t sure how long she was stood out there, eyes closed, but she was eventually stunned out of her trance by a soft touch on her elbow. She spun around, eyes wide and panicked, but was met with only the slightly flushed face of Jennifer Jareau.</p><p>“God, Jayje,” She laughed around the cigarette. “You scared me.”</p><p>JJ smiled softly and stepped up next to her, mimicking the brunette’s pose and leaning on the railing.</p><p>“I didn’t know you smoked.”</p><p>“It’s a bad habit,” Emily returned with a sigh. “I never usually do, but – well, sometimes you have those days…”</p><p>“Today was definitely one of those days,” JJ finished with a sad smile.</p><p>Emily nodded, and the two fell into a comfortable silence as they watched cars fly by on the roads underneath them. The minutes crept on and Emily started to become aware that she was alone with JJ, something that always made her ridiculously nervous. She shuffled from foot to foot and kept shooting glances over at the blonde, unsure what exactly she was looking for but knowing she was looking for something.</p><p>“We could have lost her today, you know.” JJ broke the silence, holding her gaze on the streets.</p><p>Emily, though, turned towards the other woman, eyebrows drawing together as she tried to think of some words of comfort to offer. “Jayje…”</p><p>“I know, I know. She’s ok and I shouldn’t think like that and I should just be grateful we’re still here. But it just got me thinking – it could’ve been any one of us. It could’ve been you, Em.”</p><p>Emily still hadn’t taken her eyes off the other woman. But she couldn’t for the life of her think of a single word to say. JJ finally turned to face her, brows eyes meeting blue, and Emily was struck by the blazing emotion she saw in the other woman’s eyes. </p><p>“A-and then I was thinking. I didn’t want to lose you without saying what I had to say…”</p><p>At this point, Emily couldn’t feel her fingers or her toes, and it had absolutely nothing to do with the cold. Her voice came out as a hushed whisper, a little shaky and barely audible over the sounds of the city below.</p><p>“What do you want to say, Jennifer?” she husked.</p><p>Then, suddenly, the cigarette was gone from where it had been dangling between her fingers, and frankly she didn’t care. Because there was JJ, kissing her on the fire escape. There was JJ’s lips pressed against hers, there was JJ’s nose that bumped into her cheek, there was JJ’s fingers dancing across her jaw. There was JJ’s eyes and her smile, her wisps of blonde hair and her soft cotton pyjama shirt, her pointed cheekbones and her tiny dimples. There was JJ, kissing her like she had been waiting for this since the day they’d met in Hotch’s office.</p><p>They drew back for a second for air, eyes meeting, and this time Emily let herself smile. She let the mask slip.</p><p>And then they were both laughing and kissing, talking and smiling and kissing again until the tips of their fingers were numb from the cold, and the faint golden light of dawn splashed across the edges of the metal frame of the fire escape.</p><p>There, fingers tangled in blonde hair, Emily finally let herself go. She forgot about being the perfect daughter or the perfect FBI agent or the perfect friend. She instead let herself get lost in the perfect woman in front of her.</p><p>And in her arms, Emily thought, with her family safely inside behind her, she’d finally come home.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>hope that was somewhat coherent!!<br/>if anyone has any other prompts for these two, lemme know, cos i seriously cant get enough of writing these dorks</p></blockquote></div></div>
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